Poirot swayed a little on his toes.
“You ask me what I make of it. Eh bien, it is very simple, is it not? Madame Doyle is dying; she wishes to indicate her murderer, and so she writes with her finger, dipped in her own blood, the initial letter of her murderer’s name. Oh, yes, it is astonishingly simple.”
“Ach, but—”
Dr. Bessner was about to break out, but a peremptory gesture from Race silenced him.
“So it strikes you that?” he asked slowly.
Poirot turned round on him nodding his head.
“Yes, yes. It is, as I say, of an astonishing simplicity! It is so familiar, is it not? It has been done so often, in the pages of the romance of crime! It is now, indeed, a little vieux jeu! It leads one to suspect that our murderer is—old-fashioned!”
“C’est de l’enfantillage,” agreed Poirot.
“But it was done with a purpose,” suggested Race.
“That—naturally,” agreed Poirot, and his face was grave.
“What does J stand for?” asked Race.
Poirot replied promptly: “J stands for Jacqueline de Bellefort, a young lady who declared to me less than a week ago that she would like nothing better than to—” he paused and then deliberately quoted, “‘to put my dear little pistol close against her head and then just press with my finger—’”
“Gott im Himmel” exclaimed Dr. Bessner.
There was a momentary silence. Then Race drew a deep breath and said: “Which is just what was done here?”
Bessner nodded.
“That is so, yes. It was a pistol of very small calibre—as I say, probably a twenty-two. The bullet has got to be extracted, of course, before we can say definitely.”
Race nodded in swift comprehension. Then he asked: “What about time of death?”
Bessner stroked his jaw again. His fingers made a rasping sound.
“I would not care to be too precise. It is now eight o’clock. I will say, with due regard to the temperature last night, that she has been dead certainly six hours and probably not longer than eight.”
“That puts it between midnight and two a.m.”
“That is so.”
There was a pause. Race looked around.
“What about her husband? I suppose he sleeps in the cabin next door.”
“At the moment,” said Dr. Bessner, “he is asleep in my cabin.” Both men looked very surprised.
Bessner nodded his head several times.
“Ach, so. I see you have not been told about that. Mr. Doyle was shot last night in the saloon.”
“Shot? By whom?”
“By the young lady, Jacqueline de Bellefort.”
Race asked sharply, “Is he badly hurt?”
“Yes, the bone is splintered. I have done all that is possible at the moment, but it is necessary, you understand, that the fracture should be X-rayed as soon as possible and proper treatment given such as is impossible on this boat.”